Thoughts on running Summon, by @aarjav

“I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen.” ~Ernest Hemingway

One of the best ways to learn is to listen. As a CEO, it is important for me to always be in tune with what happens inside my company and with patterns, changes, and trends inside the industry. I’ve found that my friends are a great resource for this. I regularly talk to my friends about the challenges and opportunities for Summon and other startups, and they likewise share with me things that are happening in their business lives. In my own CEO-take on Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, I began capturing these conversations on video so that I could go back and dig up these bits of wisdom weeks or months later and so that everyone else could benefit from the wisdom of what my car companions had to say : ) That is how Summon: 15 Minutes With Founders was born.

If you’ve seen the show that inspired these videos, you know that the best thing about these conversations is their unpredictability. They aren’t necessarily about Summon or any startup in particular. Rather, they are valuable insights into the world of startups — running a startup, investing in startups, working in a startup.

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to chat with my friend Kintan Brahmbhatt, the Head of Product for Amazon Prime Music and a former startup founder. While Amazon, a multi-billion dollar global corporation, and Summon, a rideshare startup based in the Bay Area, might seem worlds apart, there is actually more commonality there than you might think. Both Amazon and Summon are marketplaces with sellers (drivers) and buyers (riders). Both Amazon and Summon are trying to bring growth to relatively new products (Amazon Prime Music and Summon Scheduled Rides). Finally, both companies are in a highly competitive space (Spotify is to Amazon Prime Music as Uber is to Summon).

Hope you enjoy the video as much I enjoyed filming it with Kintan! Subscribe to more videos in the Summon: 15 Minutes With Founders series here.